Half Life
by Nobodies Have Hearts
Summary: While I was walking up the stairs, I met a man who wasn't there. He wasn't there again today, I wish, I wish he'd go away. Slight AU.


_While I was walking up the stairs_

There is, Nagi decides, something distinctly _less _about the man in front of her. It's not to say that he was Nothing, that was her job. Calling him Nothing would not quite be right. No, it was something else altogether, she knew.

To Nagi, it as if there is something missing from him. Something rather important, she thinks, though not all that noticeable if it were gone. She's not quite sure what that something is. She is sure she never will. A man like this one, whose smile seems to feel frigid and oh, so _empty, _is not meant to be known. He is one who people will whisper about, who mothers will clutch tighter at their children for reasons unknown even to them, who people will see and then soon forget, despite the impression he left on them.

Nagi is not sure he has anything to give an impression with.

'Come,' he says, holding out his hand. His face, so see through, is distinctly one of a predator. 'Join me.'

Nagi thinks of all the things that are horribly wrong with what this man, one she doesn't know and never will, is asking. She thinks of how dangerous he is, how she will become nothing and yet something, a half existence not quite like him but still much more horrible than she could ever imagine. She thinks of all the things that are to come if she agrees, of how this story starting to unravel itself will become one of a tragedy. It will leave her with a broken body, mind, and memories of a person who wasn't there at all.

So she takes his hand and says 'Yes.'

And suddenly her name is Chrome and she's a bit less too.

_I met a man who wasn't there_

Every single fiber of Fran's young being screams at him that he should get up and walk away from the man in front of him as quickly as he can. The bench he sits on seems suddenly colder than it was before this man _(but is he really?)_ showed up. Fran looks around the small, uninteresting park his so called mother brought him to. No one else seems to see this man, this half life figure next to him. He swears that a ball some girl was bouncing actually passed through the man's arm, but he doesn't say anything. Fran isn't all that surprised. It fits, in some twisted way, he thinks.

And when Fran says twisted, he means it. Because everything about this man seemed to twist and turn, making the world around him pale and spiral in ways Fran never could've imagined. And, he thinks, unless he is really focusing, Fran swears that he can see _through_ the man. He blinks and stares straight ahead, face blank as always. He pretends it doesn't bother him even though it sort of did. But only slightly.

Fran's own hands are cupping shadows that dance in the air, images coming and going as he pleases. He likes to make little stories play out with them, tragedies in his own hands. He thinks that this man, smiling in a way that was more of a frown, is vaguely like the shadows he has dance for him. But that's not really all that truthful. This man is less than the shadow but also something more. For once, Fran finds it hard to understand.

'That's a nice trick,' he says.

The man's voice sends shiver up his spine in a way that wasn't all that pleasant. Fran thinks of a ghost, but he also thinks that doesn't quite fit completely either, no more than the shadows did.

Instead, he thinks of mist, something so cold and sort of solid, but not anything you could really grasp.

Fran supposes he is a mixture of everything that was nothing. Just a being born of shadows of things that go bump in the night, ghosts of memories that never were, mist forever shrouding things that shouldn't be. Something else is there too, blended in between the_ gone_ and _never was_ of this man. Fran tricks himself into half believing it's magic. He's good at that.

'Come with me and I'll show you some ever better ones.'

Fran's eyes slowly drift over to where the woman who brought him here was. He never really considered her his mother, not really. She isn't paying attention, as usual. Neither are the inhabitants of this tiny park he's in, oblivious to anything except their own selfish desires. Would he really be all that missed, he muses, if he were to leave right now and never come back? Probably not. Was it likely that he would be making a huge mistake? Yes. Did he care? No.

Fran was never much for caring about anything. But if it kept him from being bored…

And so, one bright afternoon, at a park where the sunlight seemed a little too cold, a child who was never really noticed went missing. Questions were asked and raised by few because no one really cared. Still, there was one question among the many never asked that was never even an almost thought.

No one ever asked about a man with a red eye and a Cheshire smile.

(It was probably because there never was one.)

_He wasn't there again today_

A boy, tiny and innocent, stares up at this man, this boy who is no older than he is and yet wiser _(or is he just cynical?)_ beyond the years of even the oldest man alive. He's not sure what he sees, thoughts and pictures of all the illusions blending in with his sight. His imagination is running wild, just as fast the rabbit ran away from Alice. Perhaps it's not his imagination anymore; perhaps the tiny dream started up by a tiny person grew into a large reality. He's not so sure anymore.

One thing he is sure about is that this man needs help, real or no.

This boy, tiny and trusting, holds out his hand in greeting. He is bleeding and his friends are on the floor, possibly dead. Still, he has faith in those who are only half there. That just means there's a second half that can be made from scratch. (The world has a lot to teach him still.)

The boy holds out his hand to the man lying on the ground in front of him. The man's not-memories flash back to when he was in the same position the boy is in now, also offering someone a new beginning. There is a nasty taste in his mouth. He's not sure from what.

'Those are really cool tricks,' the boy says and the man thinks back to a green haired boy who thought the same thing.

'Come with me and we can put them to good use.' He says while wiping the blood from the corner of his mouth with his free hand.

The man thinks that this boy should be cowering in front of him, should be screaming at him, killing him so he can repeat this endless cycle of death and rebirth once more. It is only rational. But this boy is not rational, he thinks. He is innocent and believes in the good in people. That will change the moment Wonderland doesn't seem so wondrous after all. He can't wait.

Why would he do such things, the boy doesn't ask. Why would he trick and manipulate and hurt others, he thinks. The boy comes to the conclusion that the man uses other's pain to ease his own. He couldn't be farther from the mark.

Why would this half existence of a man do such horrible, twisted, painful things to those around him?

**Because he can.**

And because he can, the man looks around the room and thinks. He looks around the bloody room with holes in the walls, watching everything with unseeing eyes. A toddler with a gun, frowning in disbelief. A child even younger than the boy, unconscious, with faded tear stains on his face. A brother and sister, both equally exhausted and damaged. A carnivore whose body is broken and yet keeps fighting.

_He_ caused this.

The man's eyes settle on the boy who waits patiently, arms still reaching in a gesture of acceptance. And for some reason, he thinks back to two children who were never missed and well on their way to becoming half living like himself.

And Mukuro is ever so slightly more real.

But only just.

_I wish, I wish he'd go away_


End file.
